


(an old) promise to (break) keep

by DimensionSlip



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Crimson Flower Route, M/M, Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-07 22:49:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21225530
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DimensionSlip/pseuds/DimensionSlip
Summary: "You could have dodged that."Despite having a knee on the ground and a generous amount of blood starting to pool around his feet, Sylvain grins as if Felix just told a good joke."Maybe I didn't want to."





	(an old) promise to (break) keep

"Hey, Felix?"

Despite being on the other side of the battlefield, Sylvain smiles, almost as if he were greeting an old friend.

"Remember when we were kids and we made a promise about dying together?"

Felix grits his teeth, hand still tight around the hilt of his sword. "I remember."

"Well, seems we're about to kill each other."

"Sorry, Sylvain," Felix says, adjusting his grip as he wills for his resolve not to give out on him now. "You'll die first."

The battle that follows is fierce, both sides unwilling to give up a fight that must be fought. For country. For peace. For ideals that have been far too twisted by the insistence of one certain person to break off from the norm.

Even after Felix does away with his mount, Sylvain proves to be a formidable force to be reckoned with, keeping up with Felix's swift strikes as they come. But he's still the first to yield, a sword clean through a chipped portion of his armor.

But Felix is not happy, even with his sword having met its mark.

"You could have dodged that."

Despite having a knee on the ground and a generous amount of blood starting to pool around his feet, Sylvain grins as if Felix just told a good joke.

"Maybe I didn't want to."

The sword lands on the ground with a wet clatter as Felix dislodges it. He sinks to his knees, right into the sticky pool by Sylvain's feet. Despite shock overtaking his body, he manages to catch Sylvain as he tumbles forward, his other leg giving out on him. Sylvain gasps as the movement pushes against his wound, coughing out blood against Felix's neck. Wet, short, and barely there.

_Just like what remains of Sylvain's life._

Yet, Sylvain manages a smile through it all, arms shakily wrapping themselves around Felix's back, patting his back like when they were children and Felix just woke up from a nightmare. "It's... okay..."

But the difference now is that Felix is living it, and the person in his arms is dying because of it.

"No..." Felix shakes his head, confusion, pain, disbelief all etched into his face as he starts to wrap his arms around Sylvain in kind. "Sylvain, I..."

The strokes start slowing down, yet Sylvain's smile never wavers as he continues to stain Felix's coat with his blood..

"This... isn't such... a bad way... to go..."

Felix's fingers dig into Sylvain's back, meeting the cold steel of his armor as he tries to recall a healing spell, willing it to breathe some life back into the slowly cooling body before him. The shortened breaths against his neck tells him everything he needs to know about how effective the spell is.

"Felix... promise me... you'll live..."

Robbed of their strength, Sylvain's arms slowly fall off Felix's back, coming to a rest by either side of him.

"Just... forget... about our promise... okay...?"

Felix nods rapidly, as if the act would cause Sylvain to stabilize, to sound anything but this broken, dying man in his arms.

"Good. I..."

But Sylvain never finishes his sentence, craning his neck to mouth them wordlessly against Felix's ear. Felix doesn't need Sylvain to say it out loud--he knows them the moment Sylvain decided to lead up with that "I", can almost see the familiar curve of Sylvain's lips as he says the two words that come with it.

"...Sylvain?"

When Sylvain hangs his head for far too long against Felix's shoulder, Felix nudges him. And when it elicits no response, Felix grits his teeth. For a moment, he forgets how to breathe, his chest far too heavy for him to do the simplest of heaves. Something awful pools in his stomach as he embraces the body before him, a familiar prickle in his eyes as he casts his gaze to the heavens in an attempt to stave off what is coming.

It doesn't work.

"I'm..."

_So sorry._

Amidst the roaring cries around them and the trumpet signaling the defeat of the opposing army's king and highest ranking general, Felix cries out five years worth of regrets as he cradles the lifeless body of Sylvain Jose Gautier in his arms, repeatedly whispering apologies that no longer reach the still smiling redhead's ears.

**Author's Note:**

> **Meandering Sword**  
**Felix**
> 
> Even after the war's end, skirmishes continued to break out across Fódlan. Bored and restless in his capacity as Duke Fraldarius, Felix abandoned his title, jumping at the opportunity to wield a sword again. Little is known of his whereabouts thereafter, but even many years later, soldiers continued to whisper rumors of a mysterious man able to deal swift death to scores of enemies.


End file.
